Oh, how tangled an auction web can be. And poor Heritage Auction Galleries is ensnared in one. Heritage advanced $10,725 to someone with Michael Jackson memorabilia. Then someone else contested ownership. Of course, the issue has landed in court. All Heritage would like is to be reimbursed for the advance and let the others duke it out.

Mahatma Gandhi was an ascetic. He had few possessions and lived simply. Today, his belongings are fetching sky-high prices. One can only wonder what he would have thought about that. Or how his image is being exploited on pens (one by Montblanc had a $25,000 price tag) and souvenirs, much like Che Guevara and Bob Marley. His glasses, sandals and other personal items went for $1.8 million. Gandhi letters and a piece of cloth with his signature? $26,000.

Billionaire energy executive William Koch fired another salvo in his five-year battle to end what he deems as counterfeit wine being sold at auction. Last week, he filed a suit against Christie’s, accusing the venerable auction house of selling him 32 fake bottles.

Jane Austen was unappreciated in her short life—she died at 41. But her reputation soared after her death, and her novels have certainly supplied a lot of fodder to Hollywood. She made very little money from her writing. But almost 200 years later, a signed copy of her novel, “Emma,” sold for almost $500,000.